Composer Carson Kievman has been fighting the good fight for classical music in South Florida at his SoBe Institute of the Arts, just off Miami Beach’s fabled, chic South Beach, and he could use a little love from the contemporary music community for his latest symphonic project.

A student of Olivier Messaien, Luigi Nono and Earle Brown, among others, Kievman worked with Joseph Papp and his Public Theater, and has taught at Princeton, Montclair State, Kean and Tory universities, and was the composer-in-residence for the Florida Philharmonic. He founded the SoBe Institute in 2005, where he recently welcomed John Corigiliano for a concert of his music featuring violinist Lara St. John, violist Kim Kashkashian and cellist Matt Haimovitz.

Kievman is in the last couple days of a Kickstarter campaign to raise $35,000 to fund a recording of his Fourth Symphony, a paean to biodiversity that he hopes will call attention to the crisis of the natural world and raise more money for the SoBe Institute. You can read a piece I did for the Knight Arts blog about it here:

If he gets the money for the recording, he’ll use the services of conductor Delta David Gier and the National Polish Radio Symphony Orchestra, who have recorded two other Kievman symphonies. South Florida is a region that’s on the verge of getting to the fabled next level nationally as a place worth knowing for its vibrant arts scene, and organizations such as the SoBe Insitute are an important part of making that happen.

Here’s the link to Kievman’s Kickstarter project, with a video that explains some more about the project.

This entry was posted on Sunday, August 11th, 2013 at 4:24 pm and is filed under Composer Survival Strategies. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Both comments and pings are currently closed.

We want to share some excellent news! We have successfully moved our Biodiversity Recording Project to Phase II. 45 out of 48 pledges (from Kickstarter) have renewed their pledges and/or made their donation directly to SoBe Arts special recording fund. We have now raised over $10,000 in pledges and donations and will continue until we have reached out goal of $35,000. Donation rewards start with only $5-$10 contribution. A huge thank you to everyone who is participating.

Please join our amazing contributors and help make this project a reality by pledging your support today: